Dungeon Creation 101: Part 1 Rules and Voxels

Dungeons, Lairs and Shadow dungeon are all submission items on TroveCreations. It involves making pieces of a dungeon in a voxel editor, creating blueprints. With this detailed guide, we're trying to set a low entry point for dungeon submissions.

The guide has been split into multiple pages. Part one will focus on creating your piece in a voxel editor.

Read the rules on wiki, rules explained

Creating your idea in a voxel editor

In the second part, we will actually go in-game and make sure your dungeon assembles

Converting the qb files to blueprints

Metaforge Plugs and Sockets

Creating a dungeon file

In the last part, we will handle decorations and the actual submission on TroveCreations.

Additional Tips

Even new players, without wings and low jumps should be able to complete the dungeon.

Will you make a Lair(1-star), a dungeon (3-star) or a Shadow Dungeon?

A few things will change depending on your choice. There is not a real difference in difficulty. Yes, Lairs are smaller, but this also requires you to be creative with the limited room you have, while you are still required to make it visually interesting.

Note: All example/screenshots are made in Qubicle. But you can create dungeons in any editor.

Let start with sizes on the flat axes.

1-star dungeons have a 39x39 square base as the maximum ground dimension.

3-star dungeons have a 125x125 square base as the maximum ground dimensions.

Shadow dungeons follow the 3-star dungeon rule.

Your second choice is regarding the height/depth.

1-star dungeons

a minimum of 3 and a maximum of 30 below ground level

a fixed max of 59 above ground level.

Advice: Always fill in the ground level, even if you have no rooms there. If your dungeon spawns against a hill you won't get a half floating lair.

3-star Dungeons

a minimum of 10 and a maximum of 50 blocks below ground level

a minimum of 74 and a maximum of 114 above ground level (depends on the depth).

Advice: Because the generation of land can differ a lot in all directions, make the "basement" at least 20 voxels below ground level.

Shadow Dungeons

Shadow dungeons have 125 voxels to do with as you wish, the only thing to keep in mind is the spawn point of players. This will always be 62 blocks above the red plug.

Advice: mark both places (or use the supplied guide template) and move both the red and green point in the matrix.

a maximum sized 1-star matrix with a red dot for the red plug location.

a maximum sized 3-star matrix with a red dot for the red plug location.

a maximum sized Shadow dungeon matrix with two dots noting the red plug and spawn positions.

Helpful elements to keep things organized (plugs/socket helpers).

Time to get creative

Time to make your dungeon. If you've ever made a costume mod or modded a mount lots will feel similar. Create multiple pieces. If put together, those will form a variation on your dungeon.

It's useful to keep your different pieces in place, so you can keep an eye on the outer limits.

But others prefer to separate the pieces:

Variations:

Make variations in your voxel editor for the same room. In the example below the dungeon-creator made 3 different top pieces and 3 different gameplay pieces. In one generated dungeon they are picked for the same place. (how this is arranged will be explained in part 2.

Prepare for game-only-blocks like liquids by using colors that do not fit in the dungeon theme:

The below example has deep red for lava, and pink/green for blockers.

Other examples: blue for water, cyan for plasma or white for fake-air-blocks.

If you want to make deep water, make sure to have two layers of "replacements":